Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 199, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 August 1920 — Yellow Men Sleep [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Yellow Men Sleep

By JEREMY LANE

CHAPTER I —l—- — Waif There was a* quiet urge in her veins that took her to John Levington. It was a gray-feathered night in spring, and she refused to turn back. John held her hands tn his, and could not accept as real the great beauty of the world. He had been .writing verses as usual when she came to his door, and the gentle lines were as of her, his Mary, his unattainable. Now the flame that he loved shone forth in her. She threaded her destiny with his. In the dim. ddsty hallway outside his door be found her arms about his neck, and that springtide evening flowered in their kiss. Mary would not go back. Her family, the proper Martins, had estranged her when they refused to receive the man of her choice. The fact that his verse had once appeared in print served only to whet their disapproval. He could not make three hundred a year that way. They would have no more of him, and no further talk. A shining new and silent electric had been brought to the porte-cochere, and long-desired pearls appeared on her dressing-table. These gifts and their bald object won only a storm from Mary. When she had locked her mother from the room, and had lain upon the floor to think and resent, the spring twilight had found her, had touched her cheek and raised her from the rug. It whispered to her, and caused again the familiar tumult in her heart. John, her poet! Twilight pressed the barb of desire in her flesh; her thoughts were bitter-sweet She admitted to herself that It was not his writing she wanted, for he might not be a great poet She forgot his delicate praise of her eyes, her light-brown hair, her young limbs. All of that might fade some day. She loved him the most for their moments of silence. So, while the last robin of the day caroled outside of her window, and the soft dusk sank upon the trees and lawn, she obeyed her own heartland went to him. “I will work,” be said, when they went gaily down the stairs of the rooming-house. “You will write, John,” she said. “Yes, and work with my hands, too. for wages. I can make a song of it” “Where shall we go now?” she asked. Before another sunset they had for the name of the sallow minister who bad sanctioned their joy. They went to a small Michigan town. John worked in a stove factory, and came home each night with grimy face and bruised hands, to a small house that was lit with happiness. Mary was in a shining dream. The world was a place of beauty and tenderness and passion. John’s daylabor was something to laugh at He was strong, and his bench-mates never

suspected him of writing poetry. With his beloved he would go down-town on the summer evenings, carrying a basket, to buy groceries. They found delight In simple things in this small Dowagiac, Michigan. Their cottage was radiant with cleanliness. John grew robust from his work. His paleblue eyes shown with a light from within. He took lightly the mistakes that often cost him a day’s wages. There was enough. To him the universe was overflowing with sunlight. Tho police came, but went away, smiling and powerless. Then the old butler from Mary’s house came, and they-kept him overnight, until he forgot his errand of malice, and found himself gripping the hand of John levington When they parted. The butler dost his position, and later Mary’s father came. Her mother, aiaej-btlttbe mother remained in the railway station, refusing to set eyes

upon the cottage. It would be enough to ride back to the city with her silly daughter. ’ Mr. Martin had stern though kindly words for his girl, and would not consent to remain to dinner, when John would be home. Mary bade him an affectionate good-bye. Two silent parents returned to their mansion alone, and their eyes were blurred. Mary’s (Jays were keenly and frankly lived. On Sundays John wrote verses. She remembered the night she had gone to him, and laughed a little at that early idea of love, which had seemed so complete. Now she knew it had been but a guess at the widesweeping truth. Summer warmth raced full through her body. Her arms grew round, and she breathed more deeply. The cosmic life and beauty that were herself, Mary Levington, blossomed now. In September, when the yellow grasshoppers danced sigzag across the scorched grass, and the sun ripened the apples in the orchard around Dowagiac, Mary began to breathe for two. An overwhelming devotion possessed John Levington —his sacrament. The flood of his desire seemed to have reached the sea, and he lost himself in adoration. He asked for nothing, trying only to serve, to smooth the way for his beloved and the coming of her child.

Sometimes she would say to him: “John, I almost believe I feel his presence, our new-comer —somebody so friendly and brave. His personality—” And John would nod quickly, timidly, without speaking, for the miracle was beyond his understanding, and the *path of the gentle newcomer was not all clear to him. A thousand lovely gifts he had In mind for Mary and her guest, but he could not buy them. There was the lowly but Important matter of coal to burn, first to be purchased. His department in the factory had filled the warehouses, and the men were laid off. There were many cold sitting-rooms In Dowagiac, many chill stoves; and In February John was no better provided than his comrades. The grocer had a way of asking for payment courteous Sab-bath-hound that he was, until he got it ; his wagon stopped no more In front of the Le-ington’s. John cut down a shade-tree for fuel to keep Mary warm, and the neighbors were good to her until he got out of jail, where he went because unable to pay the fine. Then he approached her parents. The new butler remembered instructions and carried them out ■ ‘There is no one to receive you,

sir.” “I am out of work, and my wife needs some things. I thought, perhaps —” •’You have been in jail, sir.” •'Yes,” said John. “Will you let me have a word with Mrs. Martin?” “No, sir.” “But my wife Is In need of so many things and a baby is coming. Pm not asking for myself. If you won’t let me come in, you’ll tell Mrs. Martin for me?” a A buzzer sounded within the house. “Good-day. sir." The butler had turned to answer the summons. “You’ll take the message?” cried John. The door clicked shut in his face. 1 Before taking the train for Dowagiac, he sent a short letter to Mary’s father. In the little stove town again. he trod through the fresh snow. The chimney of his cottage was crested white, and no smoke was there. Mary was In her room. She had gone to bed to keep warm. Clustered about her, wrapped In shawls, were the neighbor women, huskily commiserating. They turned accusing eyes upon John as he entered. Somehow tluj

had learned of hie writing, and he was condemned. He permitted “this poor young thing, in that condition,” to suffer want One especially soiled lady had been coming twice every day to see If Mary might not be getting worse. In truth, Mary was. John knew It He banished the harpies from the room. Even the patent happiness in Mary’s eyes seemed to reproach him, and he went out Into the snow, fearing the gods of the slated skies. The city poormaster called, and corn meal followed his visit There was no sign from the city mansion. Winter broke, and even the cold was no longer a decent white. The world was bedraggled and sodden. John Levington’s dreams had withered, and any memory was pain. For the young mother April was approach to a new country, gray, mysterious beyond any words, and in May its subtle boundary reached. Dowagiac’s city council took a hand in the matter, having passed a resolution that luck was against'one John Levington and his wife. The dirty woman who dwelt next door came oftener, until her visits left a trail through the house. John could not scrub it away. Mary went to the hospital, her eyes radiant with heaven’s fever, and she never returned. Of the four days that followed her death, John retained only certain films of horror. A (pink, puckered manchild, placed in his arms a moment and then taken away; black carriages

waiting before the house, coachmen chosen from the village inebriates; potted geraniums crowded in the liv-ing-room to emphasize the hideous casket —these made him a shade in an unreal world, his home vanished. He aged, and was silent After the blackest of these days, he remained through the night on Cemetery hill, pacing, bareheaded, crossing and recrossing the sacred earth that hid her. He saw her as she had come to him a year before, with springtide trembling in her touch, soft May-fire in her eyes. To-night in the darkness, beyond the faded hyacinths of ■ older sanctuaries, John Levington pressed his cheek to the grass, and his heart broke. He lived again the manner of her love, impetuous and golden. His hands groped out upon the sod. He longed for her fragrant body. His prayer for death was unanswered — and the morning robins whistled and mocked.

September came again to Dowagiac, and John Levington was only a name there. Winter closed in, tightened, dragged past; and May arrived to loosen the rheumatism in the house of the untidy woman who continued to live next to a vacant house. Yet another September came, and the Levington baby was, becoming an old and tiresome story. The city council withdrew in favor of an. orphans’ home. This would be all the same to little Con. But before they could send him away, his father appeared in town. John Levington bad darkened. He was tanned about the eyes, and his former bench-mates found him silent. He was lean, almost gaunt, and the light in his eyes was dim and shifty. He had no more ,thought of verses. Hie tension at which he lived did not produce rhymes. He claimed his son and they set out together. Con was soberly pleased. The fast and noisy train was a miracle. Best of all, he did not need to be undressed just at dark, which was the finest part of the day. Chicago meant only rain and a sniff of beer on Dearborn street More trains, warm weather, and sandwiches with mustard. A— In Memphis Con played with the

darky boys, while his father worked on a truck. The juvenile blacks liked the white infant, and tousled him with friendly fists. At the end of the alley was a high board fence. The older boys were always climbing over, but this was denied Con. What was on the other side? How many worlds of delicious terror, and what passages in the gray forbidden maze of Memphis? The small white person pondered on the alley stones, twisted his dress, and sniffed the slrv. He did not cry, because, his father would come soon and give him a bath, and they would eat supper together. With a few dollars saved, John Levington went on in the spring, and the two-year-old rolled across the plains in a day-coach, lulled by its dusty rhythms, enchanted with the reaches of space. Con discovered the stars, but he was always too sleepy to hold them, so the discovery was endlessly new. Great snowy ranges printed a wonder-story on the fresh mind; the monster rocks were fabulous In color and dimension. A logging-train carried them around the swelling base of Shasta, to a sawmill. John found here a sharp renewal of his anguish, his sensibilities quickened in the presencp of the mountain, his old grief welling afresh in the clean coolness. He tolled with the loggers, while Con rode with the driver of the banty-engine, or helped the horses uphill by shouting. The great peak across the gulf of air became a part of the boy. He breathed its purity. Men of the camp were loud friends, the two women pleasant large creatures, but the woods were inexpressibly alluring, and the mountain—that was fine! H?re he began to know himself, to fl? his own Idenity as something more than an answer to the name Con. This food nourished more than body.

When he was three, his father let go their moorings; the old tide of restless yearning swayed him, and they went to San Francisco. John Levington could not forget. He dtank as other men drink, but no cup was deep enough. And there were other forms of soul-dark to be had along Dory street, where they dwelt —the gentle, deep sins of the Orient. John Levington’s eyes seemed gradually to be sinking into gray shadows. Little Con, now a genuine companion, a very honest young person, became more and more him, though never drawing a tithe of the other love. They shipped to the Philippines, and Con forgot all that had gone except the mountain, and he thought of that only when the waves ran high. The steamer was a gray tramp, wet inside and, full of smells. There were sails, too, and Malays in the crew. The cook was a Chinese named Bill, and he screamed at Con—a mad laughter which only himself and the small boy seemed to comprehend.

One still night In the harbor of Elopura, when a dozen lights shone Inshore through the gloom, and the ship made gentle creaking sounds above the falnf shore noises, a brown Oelebean returned to the decks .very drunk. He was in his home waters; he would show that Chlney. Con was with the cook, listening to fairy-stories told in their original tongue, when the drunk ripped the Chinese across with a broad knife. Thus some old racial grudge was settled. John Levington found his son waiting patiently beside the dead man. Con discovered that stories are not always finished. Solemnly he went to bed.

Con, Chee Ming and the small leather sack.

(TO BE CONTINUED. 1 )

She Threaded Her Destiny With His.